A Product Liability Lawyer Can Help With Your Fosomax Fracture Case

For a patient who has taken Fosamax and may be suffering from adverse health complications - such as fractures or osteonecrosis - from their consumption of the defective drug, a lawyer may be able to help. After obtaining prompt medical treatment, patients should consider contacting a personal injury or product liability attorney to discuss the legal remedies available to them. Those legal remedies may include monetary compensation in the form of reimbursement of past medical costs, or payment for future medical costs, pain and suffering, lost wages, loss of enjoyment in life, loss of consortium, and other types of similar relief, depending on the facts and circumstances of the case and the jurisdiction. Time is usually of the essence in bringing suit or making a claim, so prompt legal assistance should be sought.

What Is Fosamax

Fosamax is a controversial biosphosphonates prescription drug. It was prescribed widely to patients for bone loss problems, in particular to females. However, subsequent medical studies and clinical trials discovered its links to health injuries, among them femur fractures and osteonecrosis of the jaw.

Facts To Consider

More than 1,000 product liability lawsuits were filed against the pharmaceutical manufacturer Merck over alleged defects in the prescription drug Fosamax. The leading case was styled as Boles v. Merck & Co. and was filed in New York. The larger group of lawsuits against Merck involving Fosamax was consolidated into the multi-district litigation styled as In re Fosamax Products Liability Litigation. This multi-district litigation was venued in the federal court of New York in the Southern District, Manhattan Division.

First Prevailing Plaintiff: Shirley Boles

Shirley Boles, a 72-year-old Florida retiree, was an injured patient who prevailed in the Fosamax lawsuit that she filed and which was tried before a jury in New York in 2010. Ms. Boles’ case made history because she was the first litigant to prevail over Merck and expose the pharmaceutical giant’s defective design of the Fosamax drug. Ms. Boles’ attorneys demonstrated sufficient evidence of the causal link between the osteoporosis prescription drug and her ultimate bone disease.

Ms. Boles was awarded $8 million in compensation for her injuries. She received a whopping $3 million more than the $5 million award her attorneys sought in her lawsuit in the ad dandum clause. The jury found that the drug’s design was both, defective and unreasonably dangerous.

Plaintiff Boles also sued Merck for the negligent failure to warn her of the drug’s dangers. She was diagnosed with osteonecrosis of her jaw after taking the drug prescribed by her physician. Ms. Boles contended that if Merck has disclosed information about the health risks and dangers of the medication, her doctor would have learned of the adverse side effects of it and would never have prescribed the dangerous drug for her. Accordingly, her injuries would have been prevented.